Modern barter and trade has evolved considerably to become an effective method of increasing sales, conserving cash, moving inventory, and making use of excess production capacity for businesses around the world. Businesses in a barter earn trade credits (instead of cash) that are deposited into their account. They then have the ability to purchase goods and services from other members utilizing their trade credits – they are not obligated to purchase from those whom they sold to, and vice versa. The exchange plays an important role because they provide the record-keeping, brokering expertise and monthly statements to each member. Commercial exchanges make money by charging a commission on each transaction either all on the buy side, all on the sell side, or a combination of both. Transaction fees typically run between 8 and 15%.

As Orlove noted, barter may occur in commercial economies, usually during periods of monetary crisis. During such a crisis, currency may be in short supply, or highly devalued through hyperinflation. In such cases, money ceases to be the universal medium of exchange or standard of value. Money may be in such short supply that it becomes an item of barter itself rather than the means of exchange. Barter may also occur when people cannot afford to keep money (as when hyperinflation quickly devalues it).[15]

“Economic theory has always got to be historically bounded,” Beggs says. “I think it’s a mistake to think you’ll find the workings of modern money by going back to the origins of money.” He does point out that, while barter may not have been widespread, it’s possible that it happened somewhere and led to money, just given how much is unknown about such a large period of time.
Barter Network Ltd. is a proud member of The International Reciprocal Trade Association, IRTA, which is a non-profit organization committed to promoting just and equitable standards of practice and operation within the Modern Trade and Barter and other Alternative Capital Systems Industry, by raising the awareness and value of these processes to the entire Global Community. IRTA provide all Industry Members with an ethnically based global organization, dedicated to the advancement of Modern Trade and Barter and other Alternative Capital Systems, through the use of education, self-regulation, high standards and government relations. The Board of IRTA consists of Key Players in the Barter Industry, With Patti Falus President of Barter Network Ltd. being the only Canadian who sits on the Board.

During economic downturns, when there is a keenly felt shortage of jobs and cash, people have historically adopted barter systems. The world’s most established bartering-style system is Switzerland’s wir: the German word for “we” as well as the abbreviation of Wirtschaftsring, which translates loosely to “economic circle.” In 1934, the economy in Switzerland had tanked—as it had in much of the world. Two businessmen who were facing bankruptcy, Paul Enz and Werner Zimmermann, gathered 15 of their associates in Zurich and hashed out a solution: a mutual credit system.

In trade, barter (derived from baretor[1]) is a system of exchange where participants in a transaction directly exchange goods or services for other goods or services without using a medium of exchange, such as money.[2] Economists distinguish barter from gift economies in many ways; barter, for example, features immediate reciprocal exchange, not delayed in time. Barter usually takes place on a bilateral basis, but may be multilateral (i.e., mediated through a trade exchange). In most developed countries, barter usually only exists parallel to monetary systems to a very limited extent. Market actors use barter as a replacement for money as the method of exchange in times of monetary crisis, such as when currency becomes unstable (e.g., hyperinflation or a deflationary spiral) or simply unavailable for conducting commerce.
In Spain (particularly the Catalonia region) there is a growing number of exchange markets.[24] These barter markets or swap meets work without money. Participants bring things they do not need and exchange them for the unwanted goods of another participant. Swapping among three parties often helps satisfy tastes when trying to get around the rule that money is not allowed.[25]
Financial planners often recommend that people dedicate 30 per cent of their after-tax cash flow to fun spending—yet rising costs can now make that number seem unrealistic. To alleviate some of the squeeze, Simmons suggests evaluating what, out of that 30 per cent, can instead be attained through barter. By bartering for clothes, aesthetics and fitness, she’s able to eke out at least five per cent cash savings a month. Those unspent dollars go straight into her savings account.
No, said Mises, for if taken back far enough, there comes a point at which money first emerges as a medium of exchange out of a pure barter economy Prior to this, it is valued only for its non-monetary uses as a commodity The demand for money is therefore pushed back to the last day of barter, where goods are traded only in direct exchange, and where the temporal element of the regression theorem ends It is in this way that all charges of circularity are obviated.
When the year-long Barter Babes experiment finished at the end of 2011, Simmons discovered she didn’t want to go back to Bay Street. Instead, she launched her own financial advice business, the New School of Finance. She rents office space at Queen and Bathurst, and many of her clients are former Barter Babes. Her focus is on easily digestible advice, socially conscious investment and creative solutions like barter. Simmons doesn’t recommend that anybody live entirely on swapping: it’s too hard. But she still barters. Recently, after getting engaged to Matt, she swapped a full year of tax and business financial advice for a $3,700 wedding photography package. The photographer is a Barter Babe who has, in turn, traded her services for yoga classes and a self-defence class for herself and 20 friends. On the day I met Simmons, she was wearing a shirt and a pair of jeans from a clothing swap, matched with a trendy floral jacket she bought from Coal Miner’s Daughter, a boutique co-owned by Barter Babe No. 81.

While Swapsity trades are facilitated online, its participants can be seen in real life at themed in-person swap meets as well as the annual Live Green Toronto Festival. Over the past three years, more than 25,000 items—primarily clothes, books, CDs and DVDs—have been swapped at its events, collectively saving people roughly $200,000. About 5,000 items have been donated to charity. On average, each participant saves $80 at every swap (the value of items they go home with and would have otherwise bought). This year’s Live Green event was packed despite the grey July weather: until it started to rain heavily in the late afternoon, lineups to get into the six swapping tents spanned the full length of the waiting area, then folded in on themselves like accordions. Even in the rain, the leaking tents bustled.

Even before visiting the Marquesas, I had heard from men who had touched at the group on former voyages some revolting stories in connection with these savages; and fresh in my remembrance was the adventure of the master of the Katherine, who only a few months previous, imprudently venturing into this bay in an armed boat for the purpose of barter, was seized by the natives, carried back a little distance into their valley, and was only saved from a cruel death by the intervention of a young girl, who facilitated his escape by night along the beach to Nukuheva.

Within the week, Simmons gave notice to her employer. By then, she’d been pining to leave for eight months and had diligently saved for the occasion. Her plan now was to barter her financial services with other women for one year. That would be enough time, she figured, to get the altruism out of her system, but not so much that she’d go broke. She would use $10,000 in savings to pay her cellphone bill and to parcel out $35 in emergency spending each week if and when bartering fell through on the basic necessities. That money would also help pay for most of the rent at the Dovercourt and Queen apartment she shared with her boyfriend, Matt, who was in the midst of changing careers. Everything else—food, clothing, haircuts, fitness, entertainment and transportation around the city—she would acquire through barter. Simmons figured she’d need to barter with 300 women to make it work. She gave the project a catchy name, Barter Babes, and started organizing a launch party.

In the United States, Karl Hess used bartering to make it harder for the IRS to seize his wages and as a form of tax resistance. Hess explained how he turned to barter in an op-ed for The New York Times in 1975.[31] However the IRS now requires barter exchanges to be reported as per the Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act of 1982. Barter exchanges are considered taxable revenue by the IRS and must be reported on a 1099-B form. According to the IRS, "The fair market value of goods and services exchanged must be included in the income of both parties."[32]

During economic downturns, when there is a keenly felt shortage of jobs and cash, people have historically adopted barter systems. The world’s most established bartering-style system is Switzerland’s wir: the German word for “we” as well as the abbreviation of Wirtschaftsring, which translates loosely to “economic circle.” In 1934, the economy in Switzerland had tanked—as it had in much of the world. Two businessmen who were facing bankruptcy, Paul Enz and Werner Zimmermann, gathered 15 of their associates in Zurich and hashed out a solution: a mutual credit system.

Adam Smith, the father of modern economics, sought to demonstrate that markets (and economies) pre-existed the state, and hence should be free of government regulation. He argued (against conventional wisdom) that money was not the creation of governments. Markets emerged, in his view, out of the division of labour, by which individuals began to specialize in specific crafts and hence had to depend on others for subsistence goods. These goods were first exchanged by barter. Specialization depended on trade, but was hindered by the "double coincidence of wants" which barter requires, i.e., for the exchange to occur, each participant must want what the other has. To complete this hypothetical history, craftsmen would stockpile one particular good, be it salt or metal, that they thought no one would refuse. This is the origin of money according to Smith. Money, as a universally desired medium of exchange, allows each half of the transaction to be separated.[2]
I see a LOT of potential when it comes to locally owned businesses but it’s really a shame to see them open the beginning of May and by November they’re already closed (and they’re in locations I’d LOVE to be at when things start taking off – Dundas between Jarvis and Mutual for example) – same old crap still comes and goes though. Bartering doesn’t mean you’re being taken or taking someone ‘for a ride’ – it’s how small town downtowns survive and in many ways we can learn from that. When a customer likes what you provide they trust your judgment and are likely to check out that juice bar two doors down if you’re promoting it. The key to get back our stable neighbourhoods – I’m looking at us, Downtown East – is the commitment to hanging in there and helping each other out. When you’re doing your own business you know it’s not just a 40 hour workweek – it’s all the time. Any chance we can take to promote not just our business but what we love doing…as well as being happy to see neighbouring businesses do well…makes all this hard work worth it.
When barter has appeared, it wasn’t as part of a purely barter economy, and money didn’t emerge from it—rather, it emerged from money. After Rome fell, for instance, Europeans used barter as a substitute for the Roman currency people had gotten used to. “In most of the cases we know about, [barter] takes place between people who are familiar with the use of money, but for one reason or another, don’t have a lot of it around,” explains David Graeber, an anthropology professor at the London School of Economics.